Question

I’d like to use the function “autofit_columns” as found here:CPAN

Here’s my program so far(I skipped the DB connect and query part)

my $workbook = Spreadsheet::WriteExcel->new("TEST.xls");

my $bold = $workbook->add_format();
$bold->set_bold();
my $number = $workbook->add_format();
$number->set_num_format(0x01);
$worksheet = $workbook->add_worksheet('Sheet1');

my @headings = ('Blabla...');

foreach $i (@headings){
$worksheet->write(0, $col++, $i, $bold);
};

$col=0;
$lrow=1;
while (@row = $sth->fetchrow_array()) {
        $worksheet->write($lrow,$col,\@row);
        $lrow++;

};
$sth->finish;
$dbh->disconnect;

autofit_columns($worksheet);
$workbook->close();

sub autofit_columns {

        my $worksheet = shift;
        my $col       = 0;

        for my $width (@{$worksheet->{__col_widths}}) {

            $worksheet->set_column($col, $col, $width) if $width;
            $col++;
        }
    }

PROBLEM: My columns are not autofitted in the xls file… Any idea why?

I don’t get the peice of code:

for my $width (@{$worksheet->{__col_widths}}) {

                $worksheet->set_column($col, $col, $width) if $width;
                $col++;
            } 

Answer 1

You need to look at that example again and implement add_write_handler part too before you write anything to your worksheet.

Please take a look at

$worksheet->add_write_handler(qr[\w], \&store_string_widths);

line and then at store_string_widths subroutine implementation.

Answer is that you need to store absolute width of the string at each write. Then, after you wrote all data to your worksheet, you need to walk through rows and find the biggest string’s ‘length’ for each column – that would be desired column width.

Wish you luck.